The Celtics Lost To The Magic (Again) By Continuing To Play Some Of The Worst Basketball Our Eyes Have Ever Seen

Brian Babineau. Getty Images.

Over the course of 82 games, you're going to go through peaks and valleys. For 26 games, the Celts were at the highest of highs. They were locked in, they were shooting out of their minds, and they played a confident style of basketball that usually comes when you're winning. 

For the last 5 games, the Celts could not be in a lower valley. A brutal 1-4 stretch that some might argue was a few AD FTs away from 0-5, the Celts look almost nothing like the team we saw for the first quarter of the season. They didn't suffer a major injury or anything, they are just playing horrific basketball. What we've now watched in these two home losses too the Magic are what it looks like when the team does not stop the bleeding. What we're experiencing at the moment is your classic snowball effect.

Let me ask you this. Is there anything you think the Celts are doing well right now? Of course not. Both your eyes and the numbers tell you that right now, the Celts suck big time

On some level, this excites me. Remember last year during Ime's struggles, we all wanted to see how he handled the adversity. We didn't really have a point of reference since it was his first year ever as a head coach, and the same is now true for Joe. It's easy when things are great and you're rolling over every team you play. But that's not how the NBA works for the entire season. There are going to be valleys that you need to climb out of, and that's where we are right now with the Celts. 

Welcome to their first true stretch of adversity.

Call it a fork in the road moment if you want. Throughout the year, you have certain tests like this. Sometimes they're big indivdual games, but sometimes it's sacking up and stopping a slide. Instead, what we experienced these first two games of the homestand have been the exact opposite. There's been no stopping of a slide, only compounding it. I think it's possible to give credit to the Magic who are playing the best basketball of their season right now while also saying that this team should never lose back to back games at home against them. Period.

I think we all thought heading home for this 7 game homestand was going to be an opportunity to get some seperation, but in reality all it's done so far is drop them out of the top spot. Coming off Friday's loss I was interested to see how the Celts responded, and I feel confident in saying they failed with flying colors. It was a carbon copy of the Friday night loss, only this time it was worse. You want to chalk Friday up to a weird off night coming back from a long trip? OK. Well then explain yesterday? 

The Celts played like shit, they were outworked (again), and they did everything you cannot do if your goal is to win a basketball game. When you play losing basketball, don't be surprised when you lose, it's really that simple.

With that said, let's dive in

The Good

- I'm not sure anything deserves to be in this section if we're being honest. Maybe the fact that coming off his season debut it looked like Rob's knee/body held up well? He looks like the same old Rob to me which is very cool and a big time relief

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but even that feels like a stretch for this section. I've tried, I've looked, but I don't know what else is makes sense. What else did the Celts do in this game that was even remotely good? Sure they held ORL to just 95 points on 38/41% shooting which looks nice on the surface, but when they needed their defense to get stops in the biggest moments of the game, they didn't. 

- So you know what? If this team is going to play horrific and braindead basketball then we don't need to waste the internet ink spinzoning things for them. Everyone (minus Rob) should be embarrassed with themselves with how this team has looked since returning home. Have some goddamn pride for me one time.

The Bad

- I'm not sure how the rest of you feel, but I like these little mini series that we're seeing this year where two teams play back to back like this. It's like a playoff appetizer, and it's always interesting to see how teams make immediate adjustments based on how the first game goes. Those adjustments are what I find to be fun about basketball.

Here's the problem. The Celtics did not make any adjustments. What was different on Sunday afternoon compared to Friday night? Both in terms of their approach offensive and defensively as well as the execution, everything was the same. Now I'm not suggesting that the Celts need to change up their entire style from game to game, but how about being a little bit better prepared for what the Magic are going to run and how they score/defend?

Did it look like they made any adjustments to defending Paolo? Considering he murdered this team for the second straight game, I'm going to suggest they did not. How about being aware of off ball cutters, something the Magic carved the Celts up with on Friday. Did they adjust to that? You tell me

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How many more times are we going to see Jaylen fall asleep off ball like this? He has NO IDEA where Fultz is or what he's doing, because he's not seeing his man and seeing the ball. Only one of the first things they teach you in terms of off ball defense when you're like 10 years old. That may seem like a small play but it's a microcosm of how this game went. Celts started to get momentum, they got back in the game and a mental breakdown prevents sepearation. Something that you should have seen on fi;m and know to be ready for……because it LITERALLY just happened to you 2 days before.

When you're shooting the ball like complete shit, these small details start to add up and suddently become big details. It's the snowball effect that I mentioned earlier. This is a team that is not locked in right now on both ends and you can see it as clear as day on the tape. Mental mistakes compounded by missed shots is how a team's confidence gets shot. When that happens, you're cooked.

- I think right now a lot of people are trying to pinpoint what the hell is going on. You'll hear the team is taking too many 3PA, you'll hear lineup and rotation issues, things like that. I'm not really sure it's either of those things. This simply looks like a team that has lost their confidence.

They're generating the same type of open looks as they did through the first 26 games. The ball is moving at an acceptable rate, it's not as if they've fallen into iso bad habits or anything like that.

But what we're watching is a situation where pretty much everyone on the roster is "thinking" and not "playing". When Grant now catches an open corner three, what does he do now? He pump fakes, he hesitates. When Brogdon drives into the paint, what is he doing? He's not even looking at the rim to be a scoring threat. When we see offensive possessions where the ball doesn't even touch the paint and is just passed around the perimeter before a missed three, what is the cause of that?

A lack of confidence. Given the shooting slump, it feels like the players are more worried about more misses than just playing their game and shooting the ball with confidence. That's where the mental composure aspect comes into play. Right now we're seeing the Celts misses start to impact how they think the game. Compare that to how different things looked when those shots were falling. There was no thinking, the Celts were just playing and you could feel their confidence through the screen.

- From GS, to LAC, to ORL now twice, the formula has pretty much been the same. Give up brutal OREB/2nd chance points, turn the ball over, shoot under 30% from three. Let's check in on yesterday

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I'm not kdding when I say this, but Al might be the worst final minute DREBer in the NBA. This exact same shit happened in both the CLE losses too. Both Smart and Jaylen allowing Fultz to outwork them for OREBs in those spots is inexcusable. Grant, somehow not able to grab the ball with 30 seconds left is embarrassing. These plays in these moments are all about who wants it more, and it was clear the answer to that question was the Magic. 

Now the turnovers. A cool 16 turnovers that led to 13 Magic points. That seems significant in a game you lost by 2 points. Add in 25.5% shooting from deep and there you have it. Those are the 3 boxes you can check for every loss the Celts have this season.

Considering this is exactly how they lost on Friday, you can imagine why that's so fucking frustrating.

- On a night where Tatum didn't play, you can't have both the starters AND second unit give you jack shit offensively. You just can't. That's why Brad traded for Malcolm Brogdon right? Well for the second straight game he was pretty brutal, just 3-10 from the floor with 1 assist and a -10 in his 31 minutes. Add in a 2-5 from Hauser and a 0-2 from Pritchard, and outside of some Rob putbacks/lobs, the second unit provided no spark. In these games at home when your best player is out, those are the games you should see your bench thrive. Instead, it was anything but.

- Al played the whole game this time, but you'd never really know it. 9 of his 11 FGA were 3PA (2-9), his defense wasn't the best we've ever seen and you obviously just saw the late game rebounding issues. I would have liked to see the Celts run stuff more through Al in the post and maybe find cutters, because it was clear his jump shot wasn't falling. 

He's another guy who is supposed to be that calming presence offensively like Brogdon, but that never happened either. That's tough.

- I think it might be time to insert Rob into the starting lineup in place of Derrick. The Celts just are not getting good enough play from White right now and we're seeing what his shooting struggles are doing to the spacing of the starting unit. Another 1-7 (0-3) yesterday, Derrick was a brutal 2-12 (0-6) in these two games. In fact, in the month of December White is shooting just 28/23% and has only 2 games in double figures.

I'm not someone who suggets White needs to be a 20 point per game guy, but he sure as shit needs to be giving the team a whole hell of a lot more than this. Outside of the Lakers game where he went 4-7, since the GS loss he's 4-22 in all other games. That's 18%. I think it's fair to expect better than 18% shooting from the floor.

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- Smart's energy was a big reason why the Celts were able to come back in that 3rd quarter. In fact, his offense is what carried the team for long stretches of this game. So why is he in this section?

Because as the floor general, it's on him to figure out these offensive funks. Find ways to get guys easy baskets, figure out ways to prevent scoring droughts, shit like that. As the point guard of this team, you wear the responsibility for how shit looks whether it's good or bad. I didn't feel like he did that in this game, and having a performance where you finish with 4 TOs and 5 FGM is not what I would classify as good.

- Personally, in a game you needed a big defensive rebound late, I probably would have had Rob on the floor. Instead, Joe subbed him out for the final 3 minutes and wouldn't you know it, the Magic got 3 huge OREB to seal it. He only played 17 minutes in this game, so I can't imagine another 1 or 2 minutes would have been a disaster.

- If you can believe it, despite how shitty the Celts played, they entered the 4th quarter with a lead. Even with all the bullshit, 12 minutes of solid basketball would get you out of there with a win. Is that what the Celts did? Of course not. This is what they did

This is what I meant when I said I didn't give a shit that the Celts held the Magic to 95 points. When they needed defense, this is what they got. 45/50% splits with Admiral Schofield killing you with threes. Paolo hitting end of shot clock 30 footers. This quarter was the highest scoring quarter of the game for ORL, which should never happen. 

If you watched it, you know what I'm talking about. On their end, everything felt easy. Guys got whatever they wanted. On the Celts offensive end, nothing looked easy. Everything felt tense, almost like the players were nervous that they were collapsing again. more thinking, less playing and that's shit that cannot happen in the 4th quarter of a close game. That's when your execution needs to be at its best.

The Ugly

- In a game the Celts needed Jaylen to carry, he most certainly did not. He finished 10-25 (2-11) with 5 TOs, this coming off his 7 TO performance on Friday night. You're just not going to win when Tatum is out, Jaylen shoots in the 20s from both the field and from deep, and he has 5+ TOs while also falling asleep on defense. He's the star, he shoulders most of the responsibility. That's how it works.

- What else can be said about 34/25% shooting. Literally all this team has to do is be below average and both of these games are wins. Instead….

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they were horrific. Again. Basically for the 5th straight game. While we all knew they weren't going to shoot 75% from three for an entire season, this is about as bad a slump as I've ever seen for literally an entire roster. Nobody is hitting right now, and it's killed their confidence. It's not like everyone forgot how to shoot suddenly, but confidence is a hell of a drug.

Whatever slander or trolling or hot takes are coming the Celts way these next few days they deserve. When you play like shit you have to live with the consquences. Don't think IND can't come in here on Wednesday and win too, especially if this is the brand of basketball the Celts are going to play. It's time to stop the bleeding and get this thing back on track, because if not before you know it all that good work you did to start the year will be undone. We aren't there yet, but that's where this brand of basketball is headed if they don't get their shit together.